Re: easy pickings
"Since the company had been shriveling for some time they had apparently dealt with a number of emails from terminated employees that contained less-than-professional departing comments, hence the hurry to cut access."
They would have done better to have sacked you through your immediate local supervisor and offered to pay you a premium (hefty) if you would spend a day with them detailing tasks that needed to be delegated to those that much remain behind. It would be well worth £1,000 or more for them to do that and that sort of dosh can sooth the fury enough to be civil. Multiples might make it possible to at least act friendly. Many companies handle terminations very poorly. It sucks, but any company of more than one is going to have to deal with it.
I left an engineering job and the COO didn't take my notice seriously. I was pissed at the whole train wreck of a shop and they had finally placed the last straw so I was out of there. 3 days before my final day I got an email asking me about following up on a project. I replied that Friday was my last day and I was currently making sure that all of files were backed up on SVN, my desk was tidy and I would be packing up my computer (BYOC) and personal items on Thursday so I would only have final check out to do on Friday. They did understand, belatedly, that having me spend some time on a hand over would be worth a premium, but they then went on to insist on all sorts of other things I would have to agree to be eligible for the payment. I had to go to the labor board to be paid for unused leave that I could never take. They failed to notice that every time I scheduled some time off, they would book testing that I had to be on-site for and didn't actually get to take that time. It's a damn good thing I keep a journal at work. If your work is independent or isn't subject to continuous supervision, keep a simple daily journal of what you did that day and the times. If you ever get an inquiry about where you were on a particular day and what you were doing, you can page back and tell somebody with some accuracy.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
